I feel sorry for your predicament as it’s one I understand well.However,I’ve also reluctantly come to the conclusion that many of our Cat dealer chaps are pretty inexperienced and hopeless at their jobs,and I share many others opinion in not trusting them.I receantly had one
of their Undercarriage specialists ask me if my D9 was system one?.The same chap then quoted 60/90 days for a complete undercarriage (minus any bottom rollers whatsoever!!).Two weeks later,another dealer rep found a complete D9 undercarriage that was available in 2 weeks and £20,000 less than originally quoted by them.All this leaves me with zero confidence in Caterpillar and it’s dealerships.
I should say,that this problem is totally pandemic across all machinery manufacturers and there are still many great individuals that do know what they’re talking about.
Yes,I would expect your dealer to have pointed out where the maintenance points are on your D8 20 years ago,but not these days.I’d expect them to neither know or care where your pivot shaft oil resevoir is and it’s a fact that you and the rest of us will come to expect.
I’ve owned my own equipment for over 30 years including over 10x D8’s.During that time,I’ve relied on the support from the Cat dealers and their staff.They were second to nobody with their knowledge and attitude to help me.I never owned one service manual or operators manual in 25 years of those 30 as I only needed to ask for help,and they’d give it to me.The writing was on the wall though and I bought my first operators manual for a D8 around 2016.They are basic,yet offer you a wealth of information and really opened up my eyes on how to run my equipment,and I realised I’d been doing certain things wrong over the years.
These days,I swear by them and try to follow them best I can.
I don’t trust the dealer staff to look after my interests anymore,I guess after this issue with your D8R,neither will you.